Cash 4 Clunkers is poorly thought out

Forget all the debate about whether the government should be taking such an active role in the car industry. It is and will continue to. How about doing so in an intelligent way. The bill includes a requirement to kill the engine by replacing the oil with sodium silicate and running it until gums up and destroys the gaskets. Jesus what a waste. I'm sure some assclown like Ted Kennedy made a speech on the Senate floor "Gad by you harrible engines saurce of all aur problems" in his thick Northeastern accent and got all the other retarded ideologes into a fury.

We've got millions of older cars on the road. Most of the tradeins are going to come from a few of the more popular models. Lets go with the Ford F-150 as an example, the best selling vehicle for 23 years straight through 2005. Now in an effort to be on equal footing with your typical Congressman I've done no research, but I can guarantee you the engines aren't that inefficient. It's a small miracle and testament to their design they get their piss poor gas mileage with the 5000-6000 pounds they're dragging, block like aerodynamics, A/C, and other power options.

Here's an opportunity for someone. There will be thousands of F-150s being traded in. The engines will be treated as scrap. You can incorporate what 10 years ago was millions of dollars of R&D on the cheap.
Here are the potiential downsides I came up with:

1. There's a variety of different model years with differing specs. Really? You think they change that much? Most years I think they just slap a new badging on it and change a spoiler. Maybe the engine gains a few HP, but I think you can just black box it. The engines coupling to the driveshaft isn't changing because I'm positive they aren't working on the drivetrain and chasis every year.
   
2. They're heavily used and will require work. Possibly, but you're selecting from a big group which allows you to be discriminating and you're pick them up for your transportation costs and a trivial amount. You'd have cash to be able to work on them.
3. You're not assured a steady supply. No arguement here.
   

The ideas that came to me were generators, plunking them down in a smaller, lighter car with a better drag coefficient, or if you have a death wish souping up go-karts. I haven't really thought any of them out and I'm sure there's plenty wrong with the ideas. However, I'm sure other people could come up with uses if Congress would give them a chance.

What kills me is that Cash for Clunkers is supposed to be an effort at greater conservation and responsible use of resources. They're not even considering ways to use these engines. Just permanently disable them and send them to be scrapped. This is what happens when you have a bunch of lawyer and other social parasites running your nation.